The entire book is a kind of maggoting [gnawing], in every sense imaginable, predominantly derived from the paradoxes of life continuing on both in spite—and because—of death. Consider, as Mr. Muldoon would want his readers to, the etymology of the word “metaphor”—itself the operative function of any poet’s work, but also the dominant linguistic technique of the recurring signifier “maggot,” a sustained metaphor throughout the collection. “Metaphor” comes from the Greek metaphero, meaning “to carry over,” suggesting, at once, the literal connotations of the noun maggot (organic life “carrying over” as a result of death), but also the symbolic nature of such reciprocity as a poetical trope.

Enough serious stuff. Check out this exchange, which journalist and poet shared while cruising in Muldoon’s Prius: